Best Bang for the Buck???
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Best Bang for the Buck???
I have about $750 to spend on upgrading the performance of my 2002 RS. I was wondering what upgrades people would suggest doing? I was thinking about the MRT but since it rusts it might not be the greatest idea since i frequent the beach. Any ideas on how to squander another $750? I already have a ram air intake and a slap on muffler...woohoo
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From: Reno, NV
Car Info: 1993/2000/2001 GF4 mostly red
Sell the ram air until you can afford a cold air intake. Ram airs actually reduce power due to taking in hotter (less dense) air. Then get the Borla headers and a custom exhaust with either a magnaflow or flowmaster muffler. Getting all of that shouldn't be more than $500 or so. Then get some KYB AGX struts a little later for $350 shipped off eBay. Make sure they are for '02 not pre '01. Also, ditch the RE92s if you drive hard at all. They are poop.
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Aluminized or stainless are both cheap, so go with whatever the shopp guys say they are better at welding. No mild steel though, you don't save enough to be worth replacing the muffler every 2 years. Also, trust me on the intake. If it draws from under the hood and not the fender, it's costing you power, no matter how good it sounds. 
It's very difficult to make a boxer engine sound tinny. Most guys say their Flowmasters come out pretty deep. I personally am going to go with a Magnaflow when I get around to saving the cash for it. Just don't use generic mufflers, the packing will wear out and cause bad sounds.
It's very difficult to make a boxer engine sound tinny. Most guys say their Flowmasters come out pretty deep. I personally am going to go with a Magnaflow when I get around to saving the cash for it. Just don't use generic mufflers, the packing will wear out and cause bad sounds.
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Well maybe it will be time for the cobb tuning CAI intake in the future later. Yeah i got my generic muffler and i get a wicked backfire sound. I think it will be time for new muffler and such though. Thanks for the advice. But is it hard to find someone to weld and bend Stainless steel? I was thinking about going with the Stromung stainless steel track pipe and then slap on the muffler behind that but would stainless to say aluminum give some serious differences? if that made any sense
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You can just get a decent shop to order the right lengths and bends of mandrel for your car and then weld it together. And by asking around, you might be able to find a shop that does it in-house. The machine isn't THAT expensive.
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The Cobb is the best of the best powerwise, but it's 2-3X the cost of the Ganz, which is 90% as good. I got mine used for $50, and the guy threw in the K&N for free. Either one is a good choice.
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I went and looked around my town as to mandrel bending and there was only one shop that would do Mandrel bending and they wanted $175 just to mount the muffler which nearly made me choke to death. So I am sure they are out of the question when it comes to doing a full catback with muffler. Any particular series on the flowmaster muffler's that you would reccomend? And since this other shop doesn't do mandrel bends is it ok just to have the regular tube bender or am I going to notice a drop in performance?
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I doubt it's all that much different in performance. But, if you can hold off a while, I am about to do my own custom Magnaflow, all stainless. I'll let you know what lengths and bends of pipe they order (it's only like $9 a foot) and you can just order the pipe and have anybody weld it up. You will need a custom hanger though since you have an 02.
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I had a shop look under my car today and I noticed that there were three cats on my car. right after the headers there were two immediately then a flange and it seemed on the exhaust there was a third cat and a resonator. My shops in the area won't touch that third cat so is the stromung track pipe a way to get around the third cat?
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Yeah, a track pipe will take care of the third cat, but your emissions will be dirty and you will fail the sniffer. There are 3 cats for a reason. What you can do is replace all 3 with a sigle high-flow cat, which will pass the sniffer test if you can find a mechanic to do the visual with his eyes closed. Otherwise you'll have to throw the stock pipes on for emissions testing.
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I am pretty sure my state Oregon doesn't have emission testing since I have never heard of it. Seems half my high school drove huge jacked up trucks with no exhaust and just usually spitting smoke all over the place. There might be emission testing in the larger cities but I haven't had to deal with them. I must live in a redneck state that has Tractor driving competitions on obstacle courses as a highschool after school team sport LOL!
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If you aren't going to get a turbo, get the MRT header-cat-exhaust combo. It's cheap at $700 (less than Borlas+high flow cat+exhaust) and will give the absolute most possible power out of an N/A exhaust. Eliminating the third cat but not the other two doesn't relly help you all that much, and it's more polluting than the single high-flow from a performace system.